If there is a better community to ask this question, I'm all ears.
I majored in history because I like history. With a major like mine without a doctor thesis you can only work as a teacher and children are mostly idiots. You could try academia, but the ROI here is so much below zero it doesn’t make any sense.
As a child I was musically gifted but my parents never considered music as something worth following or studying. As an adult I bought me a classical guitar 12 years ago and a grand piano 5 years ago and started playing. I learned to play both instruments on my own.
Don’t think for a moment my technique is good enough to start studying at a conservatory for either instrument. I already rehearsed for a piano professor and he told me I must have invested an insane amount of time, that my technique is simply not good and if I want, he knows of 2 colleges that offer preparatory courses I could attend to.
I work as a firefighter and none of my coworkers even suspects I majored in history or that I’m capable of playing any instrument, it’s something I don’t talk about with any of them because I don’t believe they would understand and they’d start with intrusive questions I hate (if you are so talented like you claim and have a major in history, why are you wasting your time as a firefighter?). I already tried to find a decent job with history and failed. It’s something I don’t want to repeat with a possible major in music. Firefighting, as tiring and unfulfilling as it is, pays my bills and has given me a financial independence I never had, but I never saw myself here.
The curious thing is I have enough money to stop working and covering tuition fees and lodging for 4 years plus the preparatory year, but I don’t know if choosing this path would be the stupidest of decisions ever made. If I work part time, I don’t have to spend my whole savings.
Working as a firefighter I feel I’m wasting my life, I don’t want to be a firefighter till I retire, but this job has given me financial stability and I dread losing that.
I do my job and when I’m not very tired at home after doing the laundry, buying food and cooking, cleaning my apartment, walking a bit to disconnect... I play. It brings me joy but as of now it’s only a hobby. To even monetize it I would have to at least have a bachelor.
Is this what it looks like?
If it's a job that affords you the ability to still be able to enjoy the things you want to do, then it's definitely not a wasted life. The worthiness of life isn't defined by the way we earn money.
That being said, if you're looking for other jobs that are maybe less taxing so that you can have more time to enjoy your life, and if you can afford it, you could go do something easier for sure. (I certainly wouldn't classify fighting as an 'easy' job). The security guys at my work get to do whatever basically for 10 of the 12 hrs they work, one guy is writing a book, the other guy learned different languages. You could try something like that? And then if you have energy after you can go to open mics or something to get your musical talent out in the world without feeling stressed about needing to make money off it.
Yes open to open mike, and no sense in pursuing a Bachelor in order to make money from music. That would only be required if you want to apply to an orchestra position, and accept that the amount of people that studied music 6h per day over several years is much higher than you think.
There are many ways to make money out of music, and most don't pay the bills. Guess what most musicians do? Teach.